SavedDamned
by KNS
Summary: An interpretation of several of the last episodes in S4, namely "Promises" and the "We're So Screwed" trilogy. The slide from sanity to madness may not be pleasant, but it is entertaining.


And though omen is what resonates  
long after the hour has ended,  
and I am listening miles past these fields. . .  
I understand fate  
as whatever loss I am about to hold  
while they go on, unaware  
that sometimes we are saved  
and sometimes we are not.  
~ Julia Levine "In Spring:2"

I. HER

It's dark. It's always dark here, and hot. Beyond hot -

Sometimes there's a little light, enough for the eyes to confirm that this really is some form of hell. Light comes and goes, but it's always hot.

She's forgetting. Some things cling tighter than others, but she's doing her best to drown them out. They can't take what's not there.

_Crichton -_

No, don't call him by name. Call him Velorek or Crais or Lechna. Ha-ha, Lechna, now you're a human who likes to talk too much. Told you I'd never forget you.

Him - Lechna.

Remember when Lechna was going insane from the neural clone Scorpius implanted in his brain? He said sometimes singing helped. She's fairly certain she's going insane, too. Is it brought on by the heat, the beatings, or the other things? Does it matter?

Her voice is cracked, hoarse and low.

"A-B-C-D-E-F-G. . ."

*

Scarran heat-probe - like having your brain broiled right inside your skull.

She'll say anything but the truth. There is no truth, anyway. Some words continue to baffle the translator microbes, and she sticks to those as much as possible. Abra-cadabra, baby.

She knows how to turn off her consciousness when it's just physical. Frell you, idiot Scarrans - I've taken worse from better. They don't even know Sebacean pressure points. Amateurs.

Eventually they get tired of playing, throw her back into the (hot, dark) cell. When she checks back into reality, she conducts damage assessment and discovers her voice is all but gone. No more singing.

_Zhaan -_

No, don't call her by name.

Wait, it's alright - they'll never get to her.

Zhaan used to pray to the Goddess. She said praying helped keep her sane during her cycles of imprisonment. She said praying helped.

She can't pray to some amorphous deity. The Goddess was made of love, purity, acceptance and peace. She doesn't need that - she needs strength, power, revenge and courage.

She drags up a name and a legend. The dead bodies with whom she shares the cell are very quiet listeners. They don't even laugh at her fumbling attempt at prayer.

Look at the soldier now.

*

She's picking up a few words of Scarran, making this a learning experience. She's determined that "frell" and "dren" are universal expressions, and that Scarran pronunciation is crucial to the conveyance of meaning. The closer she gets to saying it right, the more agonizing the blows.

Pain is subjective; to rank pain, one must have a point of reference. When she was a child, an inept teammate had accidentally sent a dull-edged knife right through her hand. She'd once dragged a man through the desert, despite a broken leg. How many times had she faced down heat delirium? She'd even drowned, once.

Hopelessness is the enemy, with the silent army that attacks both awake and asleep. The chain of command is rigid: admirals of fear, captains of frustration, lieutenants of loneliness, infantry of despair. She fights and fights but it's hard to keep fighting without supplies or support.

Sometimes the dead bodies take pity on her, offer what encouragement they can.

"You need something to fight for, Peacekeeper," the half-decayed corpse of a Sebacean female tells her. "What would your captain say, seeing you like this?"

She thinks of her last captain, the one scattered across a Leviathan burial ground, and his last words: "I'm sorry." She's sorry, too.

"What about a lover?" some unrecognizable species questions. "Isn't there someone coming for you?"

Cri - Lechna. Oh Lechna, run away, come and get me, stay back. Don't leave me here. I'm not a soldier anymore, I don't want to die alone.

The corpse looks Scarran, watches her with bright, dead eyes.

"No one's coming."

The one-time Sebacean female reaches out to lay a three-fingered hand across her forehead. "You have to fight for something. It's how Peacekeepers are designed. Don't you have anything to fight for?"

She does have something. Don't say it, don't even think it. They don't know. It's smaller than your little finger, frozen, safe. A possibility. Be quiet.

Be quiet.

The Scarran captain is predictable, always asks the same questions.

When he comes, she always struggles to her feet to curse him to his face. She's predictable, too.

"Where is Crichton?"

Who? Oh, the human. Of course. From the instant he entered this part of the galaxy, it's always been about him -

"What do you know of wormholes?"

- And wormholes.

_Nothing nothing nothing._

It's hard to think when your blood's on the verge of boiling. She clings to the one thing she's got left to fight for, a dream, a possibility, maybe even a lie.

Don't tell don't tell don't tell.

Oblivion is as close to rest as she's going to get. She dreams/hallucinates.

The cell door opens, reveals Crichton and D'Argo, battle-stained and armed well enough to take out the entire ship. She struggles to stand, lays her wrists over a bulkhead so Crichton can shoot the restraints. There's no time for reunions - a shared look and it's off they go. D'Argo gives her a pulse pistol; the metal is cool in her hands.

Clinging to shadows they race down the corridors. Scorpius and Sikozu are holding Lo'La ready; Chiana has Moya and Pilot waiting close by, prepared for starburst the instant they return.

Pulse fire! They dodge into an open chamber, lock the door and try to think of what to do next. D'Argo calls Lo'La for aid; Scorpius makes some response the Luxan doesn't like. While they argue she slumps into a metal chair, exhausted. Crichton smoothes her hair, and she closes her eyes.

The door again opens. She blinks, finds she's strapped down to an interrogation chair. Crichton's gone, D'Argo's gone, but the bitch nurse is there.

The nurse is dangerous in her own way. She's Sebacean; she suspects something.

She'd kill the nurse in an instant if her hands were free, if one hand was free - but all she has are words, and her mind isn't as clear as it should be (one too many heat probes.)

Nurse knows she has a secret.

Be quiet.

At first she thought the cool metal of the chair might actually be a relief, but when her body temperature shot up during a heat probe, the metal heated, too, warmer and warmer until it was like being strapped to melting ore.

Grayza, Grayza - Captain Jenik wants to know about Commandant Grayza. It's humorous, in a way: she's in Grayza's place because she rescued the tralk. That was one frelling stupid idea. She'd deliver Mele-On bound and gagged to the captain now, if he'd let her go. Braca, too, as a bonus.

She's going to die this time. Even ex-Peacekeepers have a breaking point. She can't. . . think clearly, but. . . when John died, he was at peace because he'd managed to accomplish something. She's accomplished something, too. . .she betrayed. . .no one. . .

Gone. For a microt, then two - the heat is gone. . . or manageable, at least.

The bitch nurse is back. She's whispering to the Scarran, slanting looks and saying something that interests the captain.

What -? She can't hear. . .

"She was close to Crichton, was she not?" Jenik says slowly.

THEY KNOW.

The bitch nurse stuck that damn thing in her, ran a test, told the Scarran and now They Know.

She closes her eyes.

The stars are so beautiful. She never looked for beauty in her life, never missed it, never even thought of it. The stars came to her, called her the moment she could hear, although it took her a long time to understand. Clear, bright, free. Beautiful.

She lays on her back and admires them. Everything else may change, but not the stars.

Wait - the stars are talking. That's new. What are they -?

". . .you retrieve fetal DNA?"

That's the Scarran's voice. Those aren't stars. She's tied to a metal bunk the bitch nurse is pushing down the corridor, and they're talking about -

No.

"What have you done?" she demands of the Sebacean traitor.

"I've saved your life," the nurse says smugly.

And now she's afraid. She's trapped on a Scarran ship, no one knows where she is, they know about the baby, and she's afraid afraid afraid.

"Get me out of here!" she shouts, angry and frustrated and scared. "Get me the frell out! Out!" She shouts and shouts until the captain grows angry and smashes her across the face.

Out.

"Pray, Aeryn. It's all that's left to do."

She cracks open her eyes, finds Zhaan leaning over her, smiling. The pa'u's hands are cool and gentle, cautious as they part soiled clothing from soiled skin. "Don't fight."

She'd laugh if she had just a little more energy. "You're dead."

"So are you," Zhaan says. Her smile sours, turns hard and feral. The soft azure of her skin peels back, falls in shriveled globs to reveal the razor scales of a Scarran. Eyes roll back into her skull, return slitted, dark and empty as the vacuum of space. The hands that only a microt before were soft and gentle have turned to knife-edge claws, shredding cloth and scratching skin.

She bites back a sound of shock, draws up a knee and kicks out, furious at the illusion. The Scarran only laughs, splits the seams of her pants from hip to knee in return. When claws rake against the inside of her thigh, she quickly drops out of this reality.

Pray, Aeryn. It's all that's left.

"Djancaz Bru, I'm going to say this again because I don't think you heard me the first time," she mumbles softly. Frelling god, listen to me now - I'll make it simple. "Just get a message to him. Let him know where I am so he can find me." See? Not too hard, so get to it.

"I didn't think Peacekeepers had gods."

She jerks at the sound of a female's voice. What the frell - ? She isn't in the cell anymore, and the Scarran is gone. She's dressed in some sort of - jumpsuit? Yellow, of course - one of the only colors Scarrans can see. No more hiding in shadows. No more anything - she's trapped in some sort of chair, pinned down and immobilized. Panic - what's she going to do if they leave her here? She'd hidden a few crumbs away beneath the friendly corpse in her cell (no use to her now.) What about water? They'd already done that once - no water for what must've been at least three solar days, and she'd had to resort to disgusting measures she wouldn't allow herself to remember  
just to survive. . . What about sanitation?

Stay calm. At least there's light here. And other prisoners. . .

"I thought they believed in the Warrior Code - battle and die and all that dren."

A female - some species she can't identify. She thinks it's a female, anyway. It's certainly not a happy female: it's also dressed in a yellow  
jumpsuit.

"Is there a Peacekeeper here? Can she help us?"

On the left this time: a frailer, fainter voice, also produced by a person in a yellow jumpsuit.

"She can't even help herself," Female One sneers. "She's praying."

If she was going to survive this situation, the fact that she'd been overheard might bother her - but since her odds of survival seem to be  
falling by the microt, she doesn't care. She starts to reply, then hears the sound of approaching footsteps: close together, lightweight, hollow on the metal deck.

Oh, good - it's the bitch nurse.

"Whose child is it?" the nurse demands without preamble.

Ah - the new game. They only know part of the secret. She's not going to tell them. She looks defiantly at the nurse: I couldn't hide the pregnancy, but I can hide this.

"Captain Jenik will force the answer from you," the nurse cautions, understanding the look. "He believes if he can find the human's child, the Scarrans will reward him. Right now, he's dreaming of palaces and virgins."

"I'm very happy for him." Translation: I don't give a frell.

The nurse shakes her head. "I warn you - he won't kill you. But unless you tell him what he wants, he'll make you wish you were dead."

And she knows that's true. Diversion, perhaps? "I have dozens of embryos inside me. I recreated with so many people -"

"No," the nurse says smugly, "just one. Whose is it?"

Stick to your story, Sun. Jump around too much and they'll never believe you. "No, really - 'PK Tralk Girl', that's what they used to call me." It's a good cover, one she can make herself believe. And if she can believe it herself, then no amount of heat-probing will ever make her say otherwise.

Nurse is not amused. "Talk to the other women here. They'll tell you. We can keep you drugged, asleep - or we can make things hard and ugly. . . worse than you can imagine." With that threat, the nurse calmly turns and leaves, her steps again falling hollowly on the metal deck.

The lights go out.

She thinks, Hard and ugly - but I can imagine.

That's the problem: she can imagine.

*

She doesn't want to think, sleep, or pray. She wants out. She'll need help.

She glances at Female One, the person on her right. "What is this place?'

Female one snorts. "Genetic incubator. They find something interesting about us, try to create an offspring they can use. They've bred me six times - three died before term, three of them - I don't know where they are."

This one talks an awful lot. "So what's interesting about you?" Because I sure as hezmana can't tell.

"The organic food on my planet grows a metal skin. I can dissolve it with saliva," the female answers promptly.

Thin story. "So why don't you spit on these and get us out of here?" she asks. There must be more to it.

Female One chuckles. "Can't do that. Only thin metal."

Pathetic. Proof that Scarran minds lacked imagination as well as intelligence (not that she doubted it before.) This creature wouldn't be any  
help with an escape. "Right."

"Well, that's why they're breeding me," the female explains. "To see if this little ginninkin here can destroy weapons-grade metal."

Obviously a spy, and not a very good one. Why pretend? "And you just happen to be awake right now to talk to me."

"No. I palm the dren they give me to sleep. I can kill myself whenever I want," Female One adds in a conspiratorial whisper. Seeing her disbelieving look, the female continues, "You don't believe me," and proceeds to lecture on how everything is hopeless, doomed, futile.

She stares at the ceiling and thinks, This creature talks almost as much as Cri-Lechna.

"In here, talks all you've got," Female One finishes.

If that's true, then she really is frelled. She laughs a little, on the inside. After a moment, she wonders why. It really isn't amusing.

Jenik and the bitch nurse are back far too soon. They stand on either side of her and discuss Sebacean physiology: reproduction, ovum and embryos. She's never felt so humiliated before, never in her entire life - pinned down and considered like an animal. She keeps her eyes down and her face still, but if thoughts could kill she'd skin them both where they stood.

Hatred cools and turns to wariness, a shade of fear, as the nurse picks up a large injection unit.

"And you're sure this won't harm the embryo?" Jenik inquires.

She tries to remain calm. Drugs - bad, very bad. "No, don't. I won't lie to you."

"You won't lie to me?" the Sebacean traitor asks with false sweetness, then sinks the needle deep into her arm.

The result is nearly instantaneous. It's. . . not exactly like pain. . .it isn't clean the way physical pain is. . .it's feeling nauseous and cold and  
every nerve tingle. . . hard to think. . .breathe. . . what is she supposed to say?

"Yes, of course I'd lie to you, you stupid bitch," she gasps. Frell, she can't breathe! And her sight - what's wrong with her eyes? Everything is turning hazy and dark. . .

"Aeryn, whose child is inside you?" the nurse asks gently.

Breathe, breathe, breathe - and don't tell - breathe. "Yours." She throws out an answer without thought - she hadn't meant to say anything at all. Breathe - say nothing - can't see. . .

"Whose child?" a voice whispers.

"I don't know," she confesses.

Silence! Breathe!

"Is it John Crichton's?" a deeper, more menacing voice suggests.

Don't (breathe) tell! Can't see, can't feel - "I. . uh. . .well. . ."

"Is it his?"

"I don't k-know!" she hears herself say.

Get it together, Sun. Don't die like this.

_Don't you have anything to fight for, Peacekeeper?_

"There was another man." There, there - a little more air. The drug's effect is fading, bearable. Stick to your story. "Velorek."

"This Velorek, where is he now?" That's the Scarran - what's his name? - Jenik.

Tell him the truth. "He-he's dead. High Command executed him because I betrayed him - _"Velorek! I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."_

Jenik doesn't believe her. "She's lying! The serum isn't working. Give her more."

"No! I'm not lying, I'm just not a very nice -" Too late. Agony, this time - darkness/breath/numbness/sick/breathe - "I. . .uh. . I. . ."

"This Velorek - is he the father of your child?"

_You finally found that something. . . I told you you were special. . ._

"No," she mutters with the last of her breath.

And then - nothing, for a microt.

"No - no!"

Chiana's voice. Chiana is calling, "No, no! This way! D'Argo, I hear her - she's this way! You can't tell yet?!"

She blinks open her eyes. The room is spinning around and around. Any microt she's going to turn her stomach inside out.

The voice doesn't belong to Chiana, but to Female One. The spy is screaming in agony as Jenik destroys her fetus. She wasn't lying about being pregnant.

She turns her head, unwilling to watch even though she's forced to listen. All her life as a Peacekeeper, she never did anything so barbaric, was never ordered to do anything so brutal. The others on Moya had called her a butcher for killing the Pilot - they didn't know what a real butcher was.

Jenik must've noticed her move. "Unless I get answers that please me, you will be next," he snarls before spinning on his heel and departing. The nurse follows.

She doesn't believe him. He won't destroy his chance of reward.

Frell - the room just won't. . . quit. . .spinning. . .

She turns her head and vomits over the edge of the chair. It doesn't make her feel better.

Female One is weeping bitterly.

"Are you in pain?" she asks. The weeping is grating on her already tired nerves.

"What do you care?" the female returns. "I'm just a Scarran spy and you're a Peacekeeper."

An oddly honest answer. Her vision is clearing.

"No, I'm not a Peacekeeper." Or am I? Does it matter? Once a Peacekeeper, always a Peacekeeper, Crais had claimed. Possible.

"That's the third one they've terminated," the female adds. "I saw it on the scan. It - must've been malformed. The three that survived - they were beautiful. Healthy."

Wait - wait. "And you've had six pregnancies?"

The female nods, blathers on about fertilization and suicide.

She isn't paying attention. The female's just contradicted her own story. Before, she'd said she'd had six pregnancies - this should have made seven. She's not a very smart spy.

"Have you ever had a child?"

"No," she answers, then finds herself explaining, as if an explanation needed to be made. Why is she talking so much? Must be the drug.

Careful what you say, Sun. Remember, she just gave herself away as a spy.

But she feels an odd compassion for Female One when the spy talks about suicide. Maybe - maybe at one point the spy was more than a pawn for the Scarrans. Or maybe the drug is making her overly emotional.

"What's your name?" she asks.

"Morrok."

"Well, Morrok, when someone comes to get me, they can save you, too." It's all the compassion she has to offer.

Let the spy feed that to her masters.

_I'm not broken yet._

Not broken, but certainly bent.

When she hears approaching footfalls, she closes her eyes with dread.

_Not again, not again._

Time for a different strategy, something to beg a little respite.

"If I tell you -?" she offers the pair looming over her.

"Your pain will end," the nurse promises.

Time to tell a story. _Get it right, Sun._

"When I was off Moya, I had another job," the tale begins. The tremble that carries through her voice is exhaustion, not emotion - but the listeners might not know that. They've certainly provided her plenty of reasons to long for better times. "I met a man named Lechna. . ."

Who has very blue eyes and talks too much, who used lakka and named his weapon.

"This Lechna - what planet is he from?" Jenik questions.

"He's from a place called Vendril - it's a small planet off most charts," she answers truthfully. They can't possibly know where it is. The real  
Lechna used to brag about his homeworld's isolation.

Fortune has turned completely against her. Jenik knows Vendril's location.

Frell, frell, frell.

Jenik is worse on her than a vork on crackers when he discovers her lie. She'd hoped for a little more time to rest, but her eyelids are still  
sagging with fatigue when he returns. The Scarran jams the needle so far in that it hits bone, depresses the trigger so that the drug is injected into the shoulder joint.

Pain! Pain.

"W-well, Lechna lied to me!" she half screams. Everyone lies to her.

Agony, like fire devouring her bones. . . *Oh Moya, was this what it felt like to be burned alive?* Her teeth ache, and her eyes feel like they're going to implode.

"There is no Lechna!" Jenik shouts.

"There is - Lechna," she sobs. The air is acrid in her lungs, too thick to breathe - she can't -

"Give her more!" the Scarran demands.

Morrok is screaming; even the nurse protests. "I've doubled the strength - "

"No, please!" she hears herself plead. She can't - anymore, and she'll say anything, anything - Don't tell! Breathe -

They give her more.

Now she's weeping in earnest, gasping for air and talking a thousand metras a microt, anything, everything - breathe - "I've already told you it's Lechna's not Crichton's how many times do I have to tell you I knew Lechna before I went onto Moya and as soon as I left I went straight back to him - "Gasp, gasp - "I have never loved John Crichton! I have never loved him."

Is that true? What is she trying to hide, again? She can't remember anything. She's a Peacekeeper - they don't love! A soldier, she's a  
soldier - Officer Aeryn Sun, Icarian Company, Pleisar Regiment, under the command of Captain Crais. Lechna - he's her contact - John Crichton -

Jenik is stroking her face with his claws; agony follows his touch. Her vision is gone, she cannot retreat. "Tell the truth."

There is no truth!

"When I -" she sobs.

"Yes?" the Scarran coaxes.

"When I left Moya - I was a soldier - I completely forgot about Crichton," she finally pushes out. "I completely forgot about him. I forgot all about him."

But standing in a corner of her mind, a pale shadow in the room, the human is watching her. She remembers. . .rain. . .

The short green foliage beneath her is soft. Grass - that's what it's called. The sky arching overhead is clear and achingly blue - blue as the  
eyes of the human sprawled on the ground beside her.

"Look - that one looks like Rygel," Crichton says, pointing upwards at a spread of whiteness.

She squints. "Vaguely." She turns her head to smile at him; the emerald blades tickle her cheek. "Do humans do this often?"

He smiles back at her. "The smart ones." His eyes lose their laughter. "You know, Aeryn - it doesn't matter. Say whatever they want you to say. If they want to hear that the sky's purple and grass is white, then say it. Because if you're dead, then it doesn't matter what you said, only what you didn't."

She feels her smile fade. "I can't," she replies. "I won't. Never - I'll never betray you."

Crichton turns his gaze back up to the lazy clouds drifting overhead. "It is my child, isn't it?"

"I don't know if it's Crichton's child," she mumbles, the words slurred before they leave her mouth.

Where is the soft grass now, the idle clouds and the pale sky? Where is the hand to rescue her, the one she's fought to protect?

She drowning once more, choking on the fluid produced by the drug. Her lungs are filling up, her throat closing down - and still the questions come.

"On Vendril. . . I met a man. . ."

She can't see anything anymore. . . the sky is gone. . .

_It doesn't matter,_ a voice whispers, soft as a breeze through the short leaves of grass.

"There is no Lechna," she gasps. Cough - "I made him up." Breathe, breathe. "Just Crichton. . . only ever. . . Crichton. . . just him."

The sky is purple and grass is white. . .

The clouds have all drifted away. . .

Moya's hum surrounds her. The floor is cool against her bare feet as she stumbles towards the refresher. She switches on the water, turns it so hot that the spray scorches her skin, then jerks the temperature to the opposite extreme. The icy drops pelt her mercilessly, make frigid rivulets down the back of her neck.

It's finished. She leans against the wall, lays her head on the water splattered surface. Her knees buckle, and slowly she sinks to the floor.

She turns her face to the wall and weeps.

*

"Peacekeeper - wake up."

She awakes with a jerk - was she asleep? Is she asleep now? Which is the dream? Does it matter?

The spy - Morrok - is free of the restraints, and standing at her shoulder.

As for her - her arms are free! So this is the dream. "How did you -?"

"I watched the sequence codes," the spy explains quickly. Morrok grabs her hand and presses a few small pills into it. "Are you sure?"

What the frell - why not? This isn't real, anyway.

Reality ended the instant she betrayed the one good thing she'd ever loved.

"At the same time, then." Morrok's eyes lock with hers as they both select and place a pill in their mouths.

She's heard it said that betrayal is the most bitter of all deaths. Defeat has its own sharp flavor. The pills are tasteless.

Betrayer and betrayed - both of them defeated. . .they make a ritual of death, as all living creatures do - one small step at a time.

"Thank you," Morrok says softly. There is no deception in her voice.

"What for?" Aeryn asks, genuinely curious.

"For doing this with me," Morrok answers quickly, too quickly, the truth of gratitude slipping from her voice.

Odd - for a microt she'd almost forgiven the spy. "I don't want to be their test subject."

"No! No, neither do I."

There - that's the truth. Again empathy flares for the spy. Why can't she just be honest, throw out this game of deception?

One pill at a time, they each choose their paths. Morrok is a spy, and she is what she was bred to be.

"Anyway, what other choice do I have?" she asks, to herself as much as Morrok.

"But your child - aren't you afraid?" Morrok returns, not understanding.

"I'd rather be dead than let them have it." So there, spy, Scarrans, universe - I may be frelled, but you still lose.

Have another pill, Sun.

Morrok is watching her very closely. "Is it really his? The man you loved?"

Jenik's words. She's had enough of this.

"Do these really make you tired?" she wonders. Say yes, spy - say it's the pills, and not my own weakness.

"At first," Morrok agrees. "But then. . ."

Morrok is watching her too closely - she doesn't seem tired at all. Are the pills sedatives, or complete placebos? Since this entire scenario isn't real, it doesn't truly matter.

Time to be serious.

"You know, I had such incredible dreams for my child. It's impossible not to - how she was going to change the world, how she was going to look after me when I'm old. They were foolish. . ." Because "change the world" is a human term, and you're a Peacekeeper - and Peacekeepers never live to old age.

"Not foolish," Morrok says somberly. "I had the same dreams."

And Aeryn believes her.

She'd planned to use the spy to help her escape. But now - she's going to have to do something different, because she feels too much compassion for the enslaved female.

"Is it his? Is it Crichton's child?" Morrok presses, reverting to her Scarran-enforced task.

Mercy, Morrok - I'll give you all I have left to offer.

"Come here," she says softly, and beckons to the spy. Just don't lie to me. This once, don't lie. "Did you really have a child?"

Morrok suspects something. "I told you. I had six pregnancies, only three of them survived - "

That's it. No more lies.

Her hand snaps out, seizes the creature's neck in a vice-like grip. "I want the truth from you. I know that these pills won't kill me. I know that you're their spy. So I want to know the truth - have you had one child? Have you even had one?"

Morrok struggles; she increases her grip, compresses the spy's throat even more.

"No!" the female gasps.

So she snaps the creature's neck, and the empathy disappears.

"Good," she says, pleased. "Then I orphan no one." She slings the last of the pills away, spits out the collection she's kept under her tongue.

Time to wake up from this frelling dream.

How long had she been confined to that chair? Her legs tremble beneath her weight. She remembers the trembling of her hands when she'd gotten the life-saving nerve graft those few cycles back; she gives her legs the same stern orders now.

"Stop that."

The deck is cold-cold beneath her bare feet. What she wouldn't give for a pair of boots. . .

She has a plan; it consists of four words: get off the ship. Simplistic, yes - but it's difficult to formulate something more exact without more  
information. She doesn't know the ship's schematics, doesn't know where a docking bay might be or how far she is from one. She doesn't know if she'll be able to secure a ship without a weapon, doesn't know if she can disarm a Scarran or Charrid in her present state or if she can trick one into abandoning his weapon. She can fly what she steals - if she can fly Crichton's primitive dren-bucket, she can fly anything. Although she doesn't know what part of space she's in - Tormented Space, Uncharted Territories, Scarran holdings?

But she has a plan.

She slinks down corridors, skitters between shadows, clings to darkness. When she hears noises - footfalls, guttural voices - she runs the other direction, trying to listen for pursuit over the pounding of blood in her ears. She knows Jenik must be aware by now that she's escaped. Keep going, keep moving -

At some point she finds herself slumped against a bulkhead in a maintenance alcove. She's tired, so tired - needs to find food, water. The temperature is climbing, and so is her exhaustion. Frelling drugs. . . She has to get rid of this jumpsuit - yellow is a color Scarran eyes can easily see. She needs to sleep -

No, no sleep. Keep moving.

More running, more hiding. She has a feeling that she's being herded, driven like an animal - she should've run across a hunting party at least once by now. She's completely turned around, has no idea where she is. All the corridors look the same.

She hates Scarrans. She loves Crichton. She play the two emotions off each other, uses the energy to keep moving - even though she knows there's nowhere to go.

Finally she turns a corner, finds herself back in the chamber where she'd killed Morrok. The body is gone but Jenik and the bitch nurse are there, smiling and patient.

"Welcome back, my dear," the nurse says. "I told you if you cooperated, things would be easier. You see? We let you out for a good run."

So she'd only been free at their will. She hadn't avoided capture - she'd just been driven down corridor after corridor for exercise. Bitterness sits heavily on her tongue.

She turns to flee, finds two armed Charrids in the hatchway. She doesn't care, throws herself at them and hopes to die.

*

It's almost funny - they throw her back in her old cell. Home sweet home, as the humans say.

Humans are so frelling stupid.

She doesn't care - she's at the end of everything. She'd like to believe that Crichton's out there, somewhere, searching for her - but she can't trust in that anymore. She can't waste time with any more foolishness about divine help, either.

"So I'm going to forget about you, Djancaz-Bru," she mutters aloud. "I'm now willing to make a deal with anyone - anything - not because I can, but because I have to."

The deck is cool - cooler than anything else available, at least. She peels the jumpsuit from her skin and lays full-length on the floor.

The corpses watch her from the shadows. Their whispers dance across her ears.

Anything, Aeryn Sun?

Anything?

They're drugging her food, water, or both. She can barely move. Lethargy grips her limbs, makes her clumsy and awkward. Sometimes she spills the water, the precious water, and has to lap it off the deck. The guards who deliver her rations (Charrid or Scarran) always finds this amusing, fill the cell with their rumbling laughter. Sometimes the guard saves her the effort of even trying and dumps the water straight on the floor.

Through the clouds of exhaustion and deprivation, she knows she has to try something else, and soon, while she can still remember why.

It takes arns to crawl to the corpses, but the effort is rewarded. There, beneath the dead Sebacean, are the few crumbs she'd managed to hide before - before the drugs. She can't keep track of time anymore. She may have been a prisoner for cycles or days, it's all the same. She's seized with the urge to devour the entire stash, but stops after only a mouthful.

She secrets away the food they bring her the next time - must drink the water, but only eats the food hidden beneath the corpse. The lethargy leaves her quickly, but she feigns exhaustion each time the guard returns.

She studies the Scarran corpse. It's been dead for quite a while, but she can still make out the basics of its anatomy. She peels away the rotting, putrid remainders of flesh and takes mental notes like she's a cadet back in training. She wonders what he did to be left to rot in this cell, but he tells her a different story every time. In return for his untruth, she removes his skull and takes it apart bone by bone until she finds the weakness she needs.

The next time a guard comes, it's a Scarran. She's just insane enough to be pleased, although a Charrid would've been easier to handle. She's ready to put her knew knowledge to the test.

She spills the water across the deck at his feet. He doesn't bother to step back, only laughs as she crawls towards him. He even bends to laugh over her head, as is his habit.

And for once, she's glad.

Latching an arm around his neck, she drives a splintered long-bone into his eye, careful to twist so that its sharp point passes between the two protective, interior socket bones to penetrate his brain. Even as he howls with surprise and agony, she snatches his sidearm and shoots him through the other eye.

Then she bolts through the hatch he'd carelessly left open.

*

She doesn't have a plan this time. She's down to just running. But she has a weapon; rather than avoiding voices, she lays in wait, hides in shadows, shoots for the eyes and laughs when they fall.

The frelling creatures don't carry ident chips. She collects the weapons from the two Charrids she's managed to execute, but is disgusted by their lack of help with information.

She knows she's gone insane. As she runs down corridor after corridor, clinging to the shadows, she knows the whispers in her ears can't possible be real. She knows no sane being would rather face a group of Scarrans than be held securely in a cell.

Symmetry - she can see it now, here on the edge of sanity. She was declared contaminated; the one who condemned her was himself condemned. She died; the one who killed her died in turn. The one she loved went mad; now it's her turn.

She thinks she might finally understand Stark. If they ever meet again, in another life, will he understand her?

She runs, the Scarrans pursue. They've been playing this game for all of eternity.

When she's recaptured, after mere microts or arns of freedom, Jenik and the nurse are once again present - although they're not smiling, this time.

"You are not invaluable, Peacekeeper," Jenik growls at her.

She's being held by two Charrids; she cannot escape. Instead she manages to drag up a smile and say, "Is that any way to speak to the mother of your offspring?"

The captain's backhanded blow snaps her head in a direction it was never meant to go, causes little red blots to explode before her eyes.

"Nurse - if I see this Peacekeeper again, I will rip Crichton's embryo from her and plant it in you," Jenik snarls, then storms away.

The nurse shakes her head. "Always the hard way," she mumbles. "It's drugs for you, soldier. A pity - they will probably deform the fetus, but in the long run, it won't truly matter."

Not the baby - "Wait! Wait - I'll behave. Really. No more drugs," she pleads. She's not above begging to save the child.

But the nurse only shakes her head again.

*

She dreams, sometimes. Mostly about Crichton. Once or twice Velorek appears. He stands over her and says he forgives her - but he never sets her free.

Xhalax emerges from the shadows to inform her she's yet again without a weapon (against regulations,) and yes, she's frelled and it's her own fault. "This wouldn't have happened if you'd held on to your weapon," her mother chides.

Sorry, Mother.

Crais comes to tell her that Talyn is attacking the freighter, and he'll help her escape - if she promises to stay with them once she's free.

"Do you want me to take the transponder now or later?" she asks.

But sometimes Crichton comes.

"It's time," he says, placing his hand on her swollen abdomen. "You're doin' good. You're doing great."

She smiles, too happy to say a word - thankful that he isn't berating her for her stupidity or questioning her about the child's paternity.

But now and then the drugs wear thin, and she remembers where she really is, and what's really happening. The bitch nurse appears with another teratogenic injection, and she tries to escape but always fails.

"This won't harm the fetus," the nurse says sometimes, contradicting her earlier claim. "Why do you continue to struggle?" she asks, sounding genuinely curious.

Frell you, Aeryn says, but never aloud.

*

She dreams of rescue, escape and death - Crichton, Crais and Velorek.

Once she dreams Crichton is half-bent over her, trying to undo her restraints - but she blinks too quickly, and the image becomes that of a  
one-eyed Charrid.

Once she dreams that she can hear Chiana screaming, angry. They're going to take the embryo and implant it in the Nebari girl. Noranti is there, too - she's going to be the surgeon (an added feature to the nightmare.) A Kalish man, red as Sikozu, lays her on a cold table, sends four spikes through her body to hold her still.

She wonders if she screams aloud with agony, or only in her mind.

After that, the nurse increases the drugs. She knows that because the dreams turn sweet again. She imagines that Crichton has finally come for her, is carrying her to a transport pod to take her back to Moya. If she concentrates hard enough, she can hear his labored breathing, and beneath that, his heartbeat.

For a moment she lets herself pretend that she's back on Moya, not in her quarters or John's, but on some converted cell. The gentle hum of the Leviathan is like music, and everything smells old and familiar, like the place she most wants to be.

She jerks violently when something brushes her leg. Not again -

"It's okay - you're on Moya," Crichton says quickly.

But only in her drug-induced dreams - right? "Is this real?" she dares to ask.

Crichton's eyes are filled with concern, but he smiles. "You're safe."

So she applies the real test. "And the baby?"

"Baby's fine," he answers gently.

Ah, so it is only a dream. The real Crichton wouldn't have answered so quickly, would've known about the drugs and heat probes and other forms of interrogation.

"Sleep," the human advises, and starts to withdraw.

"Stay!" she says quickly, because even if it is a dream, she doesn't want to lose it yet.

She touches her fingertips to his face and closes her eyes. The drugs are almost worth this, this ability to pretend.

She drifts in and out of what passes for sleep. Every time she nears consciousness, she thinks, *Let it be real, let it be real.*

It feels real. She aches - everywhere. She's fairly certain she's bleeding from multiple wounds on her torso. Her toes are cold. The jumpsuit fabric is clinging to her; she feels filthy.

Below her outstretched hand, Crichton's hair is very soft. It feels just like she remembers - short and soft.

Real or otherwise, it's enough to simply lay here and rest.

A violent shout snaps her fully awake. Crichton - Crichton's voice.

He's staring up at her with wide, disbelieving eyes.

"It's okay," she says automatically.

Interesting - she's not had a hallucination thus far where she's the one offering comfort.

Slowly, slowly she sits up. There's someone laying against her; she knows it's John without looking. He's asleep, his breathing slow and even. She doesn't want to wake him.

She slings her feet to the floor. It feels - like it should, hard but not like metal, not like the freighter's decking. She stands, stumbles a few  
steps to a bulkhead, doubles over with a hand to her stomach.

Frell, she hurts. She's got a headache, she's nauseous, and she hurts like she's been beaten from skull to heels.

Her legs tremble as she stumbles to the refresher. Stepping inside, she switches on the water. The hot droplets scald her skin, just like Jenik's claws (maybe that's what's really happening - another interrogation, she's just too drugged to pull out of the dream.) She jerks the temperature down, and the suddenly frigid spray feels like the smooth bones of the dead Scarran (maybe that's what's really happening - she's still prying the corpse apart, looking for a weakness in Scarran physiology.)

Is it finished? Will it ever be finished? Is this real - is anything? She leans against the wall, lays her head on the water-splattered surface. Her  
knees buckle, and slowly she sinks to the floor.

She turns her face to the wall and weeps.

*

II. HIM

Crichton awakes with a start. Aeryn's gone; the bed is empty except for him (and Harvey.) He shushes the non-stop voice in his head, finally hears the water going in the shower.

She's still weak, needs to be careful not to slip and fall -

Quickly he stands, walks towards the shower. "Hey, you alive in here?"

She's on the floor, curled into a ball against the wall, shivering violently. No wonder, since the water is cold as ice. Worse than that,  
there's a red tinge to the liquid circling the drain.

"Aeryn - oh god," he mumbles, stepping into the shower. He smacks off the spray, bends to touch her. She jerks away from him, huddles against the wall.

"On Vendril I met a man," she says quickly, breathlessly.

"Pilot, get the temperature up in here," he orders. "Noranti, get in here - now!"

He catches her, pulls her away from the wall. . . he doesn't see the blow coming, but he feels it land, snapping his head back dangerously far. She shoves him aside and dodges past, only makes it a few steps before crashing to the deck.

There's blood all down the front and back of her yellow dress.

"On Vendril I met a man," she mumbles over and over.

Crichton stands over her, horrified. "Old woman! Old woman!" he shouts.

*

She's got new scars. So does he, but hers are worse. Down her arms, across her back. . . he studies the double set of angry red lines crossing her thigh, wonders with still horror what made them.

"Claws," Noranti supplies neutrally, as if reading his thoughts. The witch packs Aeryn's wounds with some nameless gray paste, applies dressings with a solid confidence that makes him giddy with relief. Finally, someone who knows what to do.

He certainly doesn't.

Obediently he spoons drops of Noranti's "broth" into Aeryn's mouth. She swallows without opening her eyes. Sometimes he stops to smooth her hair, or hold her limp, cold hand while the witch cleans a purulent wound. Aeryn doesn't make a sound.

"She's dehydrated," the old woman says. "Keep giving her the broth."

He's always loved her hands. Strong, capable, deadly - now he can feel every small bone. "I think she might have a break here," he comments absently.

Somewhere out there Scorpius is being tortured for wormhole information. If the Scarrans break him, it'll mean the end of Peacekeepers, possibly all Sebaceans.

He can only worry about one thing at a time. It's no contest which wins.

She sleeps. He's kicked the habit. D'Argo brings food, Chiana brings raslak. Rygel just comes to hover, seldom saying a word. Crichton's grateful to them all, although the Hynerian's silence is unnerving. Pilot keeps a set of DRD's in the corner, where they keep vigil with 1812.

For all her oddity, the old woman is an excellent nurse. Every arn she checks the patient, changes dressings and assesses vital signs. "Doing  
better," she says every time, and he doesn't know if she's talking about Aeryn or her own skills.

On the third morning Chiana's there when the good doctor arrives. "Crichton, you have to eat," the Nebari says, until she smells the acrid odor of the "broth" - something between bat dren and a clogged amnexus fluid conduit. "What the frell are you cramming down Aeryn's throat?"

Noranti waves off the girl's words. "Only good things," she replies, pulling back the blanket from Aeryn's still form. "Ready for another go?" she brightly asks Aeryn as she reaches for the first bandage.

Aeryn's hand snaps up, seizes the old woman by the neck. "Bitch nurse," she growls, "I won't let you do this!"

Crichton paws at the suddenly strong hand while Chiana drags Noranti out of range; between the two of them, they manage to separate physician and patient.

"Aeryn - Aeryn, calm down," Crichton orders/pleads, terrified that she'll again break open a wound.

She shakes her head, looks up at him with wild eyes. "Don't let her! John, they want the baby - don't let them. . ." She sags back into the pillows, watching him with an expression of such desperation and fear that he can't suppress an answering rage against Noranti.

"What did you do?" he demands of the witch.

"Nothing," Noranti answers calmly. "She's confused, Crichton. The Kalish doctor was going to surgically transfer the fetus from Aeryn to Chiana. Aeryn thinks she's still on the freighter."

Chiana bobs her head. "It's true, Crichton - that was the plan."

His body acts without his mind's consent. He blinks, doesn't open his eyes again for at least a few arns. When he does finally jerk upright, he finds Aeryn seated on the edge of the bed, watching him with her old half-smile. She's dressed, her hair loose but neat down her back, a pulse pistol strapped to her thigh.

"You shouldn't be up," he says, his voice gruff from sleep and some nightmare he can't remember.

"And you look like dren," she returns. "When's the last time you showered?"

He thinks of a yellow-clad woman beneath an icy spray. "Do you know where you are?"

She laughs. "I know where I'm going. I hope there's still food around here." She stands without hesitation, walks without stumbling towards the grates. "I'll meet you in the galley."

He wonders what will happen if he blinks.

She's changed. So has he, and more than her, he suspects. He worries about her the instant she's out of sight, but she demands space - not with words, just by disappearing. It's barely been over a weeken, but she's returned to the gym, kicks and punches the leather dummy with a smile of determination etched on her face (whose face does that dummy wear?) The only exercise he gets is with a bottle of raslak - and Harvey, within the confines of his mind.

They split a bed, all three of them - although only he and Aeryn keep pistols under their pillows. She's developed an odd desire to sleep with her boots on, but he doesn't complain because he can't sleep without her, and if he mentions it, she might go away. She looks good in those heavy combat boots, anyway - both he and Harvey agree on that.

He's fairly certain Harvey is tinkering with his metabolism; he's dropping weight, replacing it with edgy nerves. He hasn't told anyone about Harvey's return - not his best friend, not his little sister, not the woman in red who skulks in corners. Certainly not the dark-haired beauty who's looking better by the day, adding muscle and color back to her too-thin frame.

If only her eyes didn't look so distant when she smiles at him. What is she thinking behind those grey shields? He'd give anything to go back to the days when all he saw was a fond tolerance in those eyes. Now he stares and stares and can never tell if she's angry or pleased.

"Do you want to tell me about the freighter?" he hesitantly offers one evening as the sleep cycle is beginning. He's terrified she'll say yes,  
start talking and tell him things he hasn't even imagined in his nightmares.

"What freighter?" she returns, calmly dragging the brush through her long hair.

"The one you were held prisoner on," he says testily. He's not angry, not really - only horribly afraid. Afraid she'll talk, afraid she won't, afraid  
she'll pretend like nothing ever happened and one day will end up shooting herself while he's hunting for raslak in the galley.

She doesn't pause in brushing her hair. "There's nothing to say," she replies. "But I did want to tell you - you can kill a Scarran quite  
effectively if you pierce its eye with a long, sharp object. It's messy, and you have to avoid the two intercranial socket bones, but it works. Don't forget."

Oh no. He won't.

*

While he constantly fights with Harvey, the rest of the ship's crew is returning to normal. Normal for Moyans, at any rate. D'Argo spends his time in Lo'La, trying out new gadgets and practicing new maneuvers - he's like a kid with his first real car. Chiana goes with him more now than she did before, but she sticks closer to Aeryn, too - when she's allowed. Sometimes Aeryn snaps at her, or they bicker like the sisters they're not. Noranti's back to cooking mysterious stews that everyone's hesitant to eat. Even Rygel's back to complaining.

"Frell it, why don't I ever get a second round of grolak?" the Hynerian demands at every evening meal. "Chiana, why don't you cook more? I know you're capable of that much effort."

The grey girl rolls her eyes and makes an obscene gesture. "I make plenty, your lowness. If you want more, cook it yourself."

"I can make more," Noranti says brightly. "And I know a wonderful sauce to go with it."

Even Harvey cringes at that offer.

Crichton breaks at last meal, no longer able to suppress the voice that constantly whispers in his mind. Between passing Chiana the plate of  
swiblets and opening another bottle of raslak, he blurts out, "I have to go back for Scorpius. Harvey says he knows about wormhole technology, and I can't let the Scarrans get it from him."

Chiana's hand freezes in mid-air, the plate balanced on her palm. Rygel stops chewing. D'Argo frowns darkly. Aeryn takes the bottle from Crichton's grasp and drinks the entire thing at one go.

"I was beginning to think you'd never come to your senses," Sikozu says into the silence. She plucks a swiblet from the plate on Chiana's hands, pops it into her mouth with a satisfied grin.

Then the chamber erupts into noisy dissent.

"I thought Harvey was gone." "Feck-face doesn't know dren - " "We can't possibly go after him. . ." "I know a perfect soup to bring us luck!"

The human ducks his head, allows the protests to wash over him like water over a stone. In the end, he knows they'll support him - they're just as afraid of wormhole technology in Scarran hands as he is.

Except for her. He doesn't think she's afraid of anything anymore.

Unless it's going back. A Scarran military base - locked into close quarters with the creatures who tortured her.

_Hey, honey - we never go out anymore. Wanna go back to hell with me? _

His eyes slide sideways to gauge her reaction.

Aeryn's calmly eating her swiblets, licking the red juice from her fingers between bites, washing it down with his raslak. She catches his glance and grins.

"What do you think?" he asks. He's half afraid of her answer.

"I think it's about symmetry," she replies vaguely, but with a smile. "We're going to need a frelling good plan."

She slides him back the bottle of raslak.

Suddenly he's more worried about her than the Scarrans obtaining wormhole technology.

*

Sikozu waylays him in a corridor. With her usual tact she declares, "You can't bring Aeryn with us, Crichton. Scorpius is counting on us far too much for her to ruin things."

"You're nuts, Goldilocks," he returns lightly. "She's the best weapon we have." He strides past her, grinning to cover his disquiet at the Kalish's words.

"She's insane, Crichton," Sikozu throws after him. When he turns to face her, she adds, "Don't pretend you can't see it. I know you've seen the signs: the way she charges at shadows, how she's never without a weapon - "

"Aeryn's a soldier, Sputnik - she's always loved her guns," he laughs - but he's thinking of the woman who combs her hair and speaks of murder, without missing a stroke.

Sikozu rolls her eyes. "Alright," she says in a strained voice, "then explain this." She moves a few steps back down the corridor. He follows her to an air vent near the deck. She kneels down, sets her hands on the grill and pulls. "Look."

He hunches down beside her, takes a peak, finds a stash of day-old grolak, hard and dry. "So? Sparky's been hiding food again. He hates Granny's cooking."

Then the Kalish sighs and looks at him with something akin to pity. "Aeryn put this here. Aeryn, not Rygel. If you don't believe me, ask Pilot. He's had the DRDs clean away the remains every few solar days." She pauses, adds almost gently, "You really didn't know, did you?"

He turns his head.

So maybe she is a little off her game. Maybe she does cling to shadows and sleep with her back towards the wall. Maybe he's a little crazy, too - maybe they all are. They're headed back towards Scarran space, aren't they? Insanity is an asset in this end of the universe.

"Sikozu says I should demand to be part of the Peacekeeper-Scarran talks," he tells Aeryn as they go through their "morning" rituals of dentic and dressing. He thinks the idea is stupid, idiotic, but it's a starting place, at least. "She says I can distract them all while D'Argo grabs Scorpius."

Aeryn continues to check her pistol when she answers. "You can't come down on the Peacekeeper side - the Scarrans know they hate you. You can't side with the Scarrans - Peacekeepers know you hate them." She nods in satisfaction, snaps the weapon in its holster at her thigh.

"So I'll be on my own side," he says lightly, watching her in the mirror as he runs a razor across his chin. "That's the side you're on, right? You always pick winners." Which is absolutely not true, historically speaking.

"Of course." She sits down on the edge of the bed and pulls on a sock. "Both sides want you, want what you have. Wormhole technology." Says it like it's some kind of transmittable disease, which in some ways, it is.

He dries his face with a bath sheet. "Let's give it to them both, then - they can kill each other off, and we'll stay out of the way." And now he knows he's crazy, because he's only half joking.

"I don't hate all Peacekeepers, and I certainly don't hate all Sebaceans," Aeryn says thoughtfully. She doesn't say anything about Scarrans.

She bends to fasten her boots; he watches her hair flood over her shoulder to hide her face. He doesn't know what she's thinking, what she feels - if she feels anything anymore. He'd sell his soul to be out of this mess, to be safe and secure and free to discover is he can superglue the pieces of their life back together.

Realization comes to him in the next breath. That's it -

"I'll sell it. I'll just sell the damn knowledge to the highest bidder."

Sikozu is furious that Aeryn is going. The red woman sulks in the back of D'Argo's ship and only speaks when necessary. Fine with him - he's tired of her advice, anyway - mostly because he's afraid she might be right.

He's afraid to take Aeryn into this Scarran hell, but even more afraid not to. She'd never stay behind willingly, and if he kept her back by force or deception - she may not follow, but she wouldn't be there when he returned, either. If he returned.

When they dock at the Scarran base, he can't risk showing any favor for her. They exit Lo'La singly but walk in twos through the bay. Aeryn walks beside him, her face set and cold, her eyes everywhere. All hail the soldier and the scientist, both of them crazy as loons.

It feels like Scorpius' command carrier all over again. If he glances over his shoulder, will Talyn and Crais be behind him?

Scarrans like warm temperatures. The air is stifling-hot. But when he looks at Aeryn, she's not sweating or breathing heavily. Maybe it's only fear making little rivulets down the back of his neck.

He's certainly afraid.

"Which way to the conference?" he demands of the first short-faced Scarran to cross his path.

_Can you tell me how to get, How to get to Sesame Street? _

If this is insanity, it's not so bad. Kinda nice, actually - he doesn't give a damn about anything. The ominous fear he'd felt as he walked towards this instant disappears when he crosses the threshold and sees his worst nightmares seated around a table. The oddity of the situation strikes him as hilarious, like some dark-humored joke_: Commandant Grayza and Emperor Staleek are sitting at a table - stop me if you've heard this one. . . _

"John Crichton," Grayza says, sounding not at all surprised.

"And partner," he adds glibly, then wants to kick himself. _Don't call attention to the shadow behind you, you fool._

He steps away from her into the spotlight. Let the show begin - he wonders if the one-man act is more like a Shakespearean soliloquy or stand-up comedy. While his mouth blathers on about trinium shell and plutonium core, his mind - the sanest or most insane part - is thinking of the shadow behind him.

She'd been liquid fire when they met, and for years afterwards. A dip in mortality's icy waters sobered her somewhat, but watching others dissipate, die, and implode was what finally smothered the flame. It hadn't helped that he'd been there to offer water-logged splinters of kindling when she'd tried rubbing two sticks together. Now she's cold, dark - his own Black Ghost. Maybe it was inevitable - maybe it's what happens to all Commandos who survive long enough. It doesn't really matter.

_Concentrate, John!_ Harvey howls. _We're here for Scorpius!_

Only because he helped Aeryn.

He delivers his much-rehearsed "don't cross me" speech into a kind of dubious silence. Ahkna obviously doesn't appreciate the poetic aspects he so carefully intertwined. "Because you lack imagination," he informs her honestly. Critics - everywhere, critics. An artist is never appreciated.

The Scarran in red didn't get his job because of his looks: he recognizes a nutcase when he sees one. "What do you want?" Staleek demands.

Aeryn Sun.

_Scorpius_! Harvey shouts.

"What do I want?" Crichton echoes, as if the question is absurd. "What do _I_ want?" No, no - it's really, "You want something!" but the good king - emperor, whatever - is playing politics. "You." Because it was never about him, not really. He slings his legs up on the polished semi-circular table, sets the boots that have been god-knows-where all over the galaxy on its shiny surface. I-can-do-this and I-can-do-that he boldly proclaims as he strolls before them.

None of them would guess what he can't do by the way he brags about what he can.

_Focus, John,_ Harvey warns.

It's not about Scorpius.

Even "command the stars." "But I have," he tells them all softly.

Even if it was a different him. He looks to the only survivor in the room to know the truth. Once he told her, "I'm not him - I'm me." Him, Crichton, the other, Crichton - who gives a damn. He'll be whoever she wants him to be.

Aeryn smiles at Crichton - which one, he doesn't care.

Time to make the sales pitch. He throws out a handful of references they can't possibly understand and hopes they somehow get the message that what he really wants is to be left the hell alone. He doubts they'll ever understand.

"He's crazy!" the Kalish delegate announces.

"Isn't it fun?" The first words of the Black Ghost are filled with approval and a hint of pleasure.

Crichton can't help but smile at her. _It's all for you, baby._

"Welcome to my cold war. Now, what am I offered for all the powers of the universe?"

Staleek politely requests a recess. Grayza and Braca all but scurry from the room. The Kalish disappear into the shadows, and even the guards accompany the Scarrans from the chamber.

Only the Black Ghost remains.

"Well done," she says simply.

Aeryn seems more surprised that D'Argo agrees to let John fly his ship unsupervised than she is that Grayza makes the first offer. "He really loves that ship. And you always thought I was attached to my prowler."

Within the little chamber they've been awarded "to speak privately," they've divided the enemies into manageable chunks. It's a crazy, idiotic plan, almost entirely his, almost entirely guaranteed to fail. If he ever makes it back to Earth, he's going to run a pyramid scheme or two; he's great at selling dreams and wind.

"Grayza's not stupid," Rygel comments. "No more than any other member of her species, at any rate. She's sounding out the bargaining space."

"She's going to make an emotional appeal," Aeryn says, absently scowling at the closed hatch. "She knows how emotional Crichton is, how much he values life, how he wonders at the ties between Sebaceans and humans. She'll use it against him, like any other 'weapon in her arsenal.'"

"You hate her, don't you?" Sikozu's words are almost a challenge.

"Everyone hates her," Chiana grumbles.

Aeryn turns half-hooded eyes on the Kalish. "Grayza is the worst excuse for a soldier I've ever come across. Without honor, cowardly - a disgrace to the ranks and the race. I don't feel anything more for her than I do this table." Her eyes flicker down to the circular table, then away.

Sikozu gives Crichton an I-told-you-so look. "Are we any different?" This time, it is a challenge.

Crichton quickly hooks a hand around Aeryn's arm. "Time to go."

The Ghost resists long enough to tell the Kalish, "Some of you." Then she lets him propel her from the chamber.

She won't walk beside him anymore. Is it some part of the charade that they're playing, her part in this insane play - to always be a step behind, his shadow, his guard? Maybe. Maybe not. She's always been his protector in this end of the galaxy, always answered his shouts/screams/whispers for help. Always - or, almost always. Close enough. On Earth it was different; he didn't need the same sort of help. He'd needed space, time - she'd tried to give him both until the point where even she'd run out of resources. But now -? It's harder to tell what comes from the shadows.

He wants the old days back. Too late; all gone.

They go to see Grayza, return to the base as "free" criminals. It doesn't feel any different. When the Scarran DRD scans his new toy, Aeryn  
looks ready to stomp on it, squish it like a bug.

"1812, get that Scarran vacuum cleaner outta here," he orders before Aeryn snaps and DRD guts go all over the deck. "That's a good boy." He moves to sit at the table; Aeryn takes up a defensive stance, scanning the shadows with narrowed eyes.

_Sit down for a minute,_ he wants to say, and doesn't. She wouldn't appreciate his coddling her now, reminding her how weak she was not so long ago. Does she even remember? Best not to know.

He can't afford any weakness now, either. Too expensive - even for a nuclear terrorist.

When Staleek comes marching through the hatch, Aeryn's back is to him. She whirls so fast that Crichton can all but see her hand reaching for a weapon.

"You came back," he says quickly, so she won't do something hasty.

Not that she does, anymore.

*

Hide and seek with Scorpius as the prize. Chiana and Noranti are the lucky winners.

"Scorpius can't possibly hold out much longer," Noranti warns them, her center eye wide with conviction.

"If he hasn't broken already," Aeryn comments.

What is that he hears in her voice - disgust, fear, disappointment? No, not emotion - the lack thereof. She's just stating a possibility.

"We'll work on it. Gotta see his highness first," Crichton tells the witch. He doesn't know how long that might take - the snake king can't be a happy camper at the moment, not after losing a few of his toys.

"If we can't make it to Lo'La, we're going to need to be looking for alternate escape routes," Aeryn tells Chiana as they walk to meet the  
emperor.

"To the surface?" The Nebari sounds doubtful.

Aeryn nods.

"I'll keep looking." But they grey girl doesn't sound optimistic.

"Thank you." And Aeryn finally has some softness to her voice, a note of encouragement to comfort a friend.

He's glad about that - but not about her wanting a route to the surface. They're on a military base - where are they gonna go? Does Aeryn think Grayza might give them a lift? Moya can't get in close enough, quickly enough.

Never mind. Aeryn has her reasons. He's pretty sure he doesn't want to know the details.

He was right - the emperor's a mad little boy.

"You have cost me a stryker and its crew," Staleek pronounces the instant they're though the door.

"Really? How'd I do that?" He keeps his voice bored. At his back, Aeryn stands very still.

Staleek snarls accusations, angry words; Crichton shouts back, and slowly gives ground until the hatch closes between them.

"You don't think I pushed him too hard, do you?" he consults Aeryn once the hatch is secure.

She shrugs, doesn't seem concerned. "He'll make an offer."

The universe really is a small place. They run across an old friend in the corridor.

"Nice pants," Crichton flings at the passing Peacekeeper, only realizes an instant later who's wearing them. "Hey, Braca - you look a little lost."

"Does Mommy know you're here?" Aeryn asks smoothly, her voice cool as a knife's edge, and just as deadly.

He can't remember the last time she made a joke like that. It makes him feel easier - there's still something left of his old girl, somewhere in there.

"Does Mommy know he's Scorpius' boy?" he adds softly.

Braca's eyes flash with emotion, but only for an instant.

Busted! "Oh no - Mommy doesn't know." And this could be worth quite a bit. Braca's got a secret. . .

But the captain steps towards them boldly. "Are you here to rescue him, or kill him?" he challenges evenly.

To Crichton's surprise, Aeryn actually laughs. "He's already dead, Braca. There are a few pieces left - what are those worth to you?"

Braca grinds his teeth. "You'd know, from what I hear." He spins on his heel and marches back down the corridor.

Crichton watches him go. "Think he'll try something?"

"Not until he's certain we won't." Aeryn snorts. "Or unless Mommy tells him to."

*

Scarrans really are different than Peacekeepers. Even on a command carrier, a prisoner of Scorpius' worth would be surrounded by commandos, locked under Deca security clearance. On Katratzi, he and Aeryn can walk right over to the interrogation room, where only one guard watches the door. Ah, cultural differences.

"We're here to see Scorpius," he tells the guard, as if the Scarran is some sort of waiter. Table for two, please - no smoking.

"Come in," Ahkna calls from within. "Just you," she adds, pointedly not looking at Aeryn.

Uh-oh. Not good. Stay together.

Aeryn lightly shoves him in the back. She's not afraid.

He's hesitant to show that he is. Without a backward glance he moves into the room's shadows. Ahkna watches him with a small, feral smile. He steps towards the main entertainment.

Oh god.

The half-breed looks like he's been butchered alive. Stuffed into a tiny, circular cage, glinting spikes splattered and splotched with new blood and old. . .it's too low for Scorpius to stand upright, too narrow for him to do more than perch on one narrow ledge -

He's going to be sick, right here in front of everybody.

_No, John! No weakness,_ Harvey howls. _They'll kill you in an instant if they learn how frightened you are. They'll recapture Aeryn - /i]_

No! No.

He glances at Aeryn.

The Black Ghost nods quickly. She's still not afraid.

Now he understands why. After weekens of Scarran inquisition, what's left to fear?

He steps up onto the dias, approaches the cage's occupant.

Scorpius is barely able to lift his head. When he speaks, his voice is very low. "John."

"Grasshopper." It doesn't give him pleasure of any sort to see Scorpius like this, even after all the years of pain and death: Gilina, Zhaan, Crais, Talyn, starvation, banishment, forced marriage, the Aurora Chair, the neural clone. And when he looks at the half-breed, who may or may not deserve his fate, he sees Scorpius, but he also sees Aeryn.

Again he looks to Aeryn.

She nods more forcefully. She wants him to hurry up, get out and report the extent of the damage. He has a job, he needs to do it.

He steps down to face Ahkna. They stare at each other with open dislike, no pretension of respect between them. Each one despises the other.

"That's a nice hat," he says smugly.

And an instant later he's on his knees, feeling like his brain is being squeezed out between the bones of his skull.

"Ahkna, don't - " he distantly hears Aeryn warn, and then sounds of struggle. . .

"What did you say - too happy, too sad, too cold, too hot?" Ahkna all but purrs as she half-bends over him. "Let's see, hmmm?"

All he really knows for sure in that moment is that he's never gonna set foot in a sauna ever again. Damn the heat -!

"I know you have a real nuclear device, but I'm sure you can disarm it," the Scarran female says confidently.

At least, he thinks that's what she says. Is that Aeryn in the background? There was - another Scarran -

"I would - but - I can't," he grinds out.

Focus, John! Harvey insists.

On what? My brain turning to goo? he snaps back.

Aeryn -

"You're bluffing," Ahkna challenges.

He makes some smart-ass retort that he'll never remember, but it gets him clear. The sudden absence of mind-numbing heat leaves him breathless, hugging the deck. Somehow Aeryn is beside him.

"You all right?" she asks, sounding genuinely concerned. She all but yanks him to his feet; against logic, it makes him feel better to stand. "You're mad," she accuses.

That almost makes him laugh. She thinks he's the crazy one? Well, at least they're an even pair. "Nah. Just playin' a game of chicken. Did I win?"

"Just. This time."

The worry in her voice makes him feel guilty. "You take the initiative next time," he says smartly, so she'll know he's mostly okay.

That changes something about her. The concern ices over in her eyes, disappears beneath the grey shields that betray nothing. "I'll take it now," she says quietly, and steps towards the dias.

Quickly he lays a hand on her. "Not yet," he says hurriedly.

She's not listening. She's looking up at Scorpius, emotion nowhere on her face.

"Aeryn," he insists. Bringing her into this hell-cell wasn't a good idea. Not a good idea at all.

Suddenly she shrugs and moves past him.

With one split glance between Ahkna and Scorpius, he follows.  


He's okay for the first few steps, shaky for the next handful, way off his gait by the time they're down the corridor and around the bend. He can't help it, can't stop thinking about blood-covered blades and small spaces and the look of absolute exhaustion and resignation on Scorpius' face - Aeryn's face, a double set of wounds that still seep, cramming food into the air vents. . .

He stops walking, puts his hands to his head. The bomb is cycling dangerously fast.

Aeryn hooks a hand under his arm, yanks him forward, makes him move. "Keep going."

"No," he says, shaking his head. The walls are pressing in on him; he can't get enough air. "How do you do it? How can you possibly survive after that? It's disgusting and evil and how can you not be screaming in corners now that it's over? Tell me, Aeryn - tell me. . ."

The bomb is wailing at his hip.

The Black Ghost jerks him around a corner, thrusts him against a bulkhead, shakes him until his head snaps back and hits the wall, sending clouds of darkness before his eyes.

He sucks in a huge breath, desperate for air; when his vision clears, he finds Aeryn patiently standing mere denches from him, waiting.

The bomb slowly cycles back into its normal pattern.

"That's how," Aeryn says tersely, all but a growl. "One microt at a time. No before, no after. And if it should ever end, you close your eyes and shut your mouth and never, never think about it." She meets his gaze for a moment, then steps back. "Don't ever again make me watch while you toy with death."

He takes another breath, nods shortly.

One microt at a time.

*

Sikozu is mega-mad at him for leaving her hero with Ahkna. "You found Scorpius being tortured and you just left him there?" the Kalish demands, stomping down the corridor ahead of them.

"It's not time yet," Crichton answers, because Aeryn obviously isn't planning to. Her eyes are busy scouring the shadows, watching for traps; she doesn't care about the red woman. But he does, at least a little - he knows what it's like to be helpless to aid a friend.

Two doors ahead of them suddenly slide open, and out pop a handful of Charrids. He nods at them pleasantly. "Morning," he says, briefly considers serenading them with Mr. Rodger's theme song. _It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood. . ._

Aeryn follows Sikozu into the small room. "As long as this will help start the conflict. . ." Her voice carries a note of warning.

"Yes, it will," the Kalish woman snaps. "You may even get yourselves killed." A possibility that doesn't seem to worry her too much.

He's in the tiny room for a good few microts before he realizes that it's an elevator - a level riser. Talk about journey to the center of the earth. Going down. . . "Then we'll all go together," he tells Sikozu brightly, and waves as the doors slide shut.

There's a faint hum as the elevator descends. Lights are flashing on the console against the far wall. The place could use a little music.

He glances at Aeryn. Security momentarily guaranteed, she's practically asleep on her feet: eyes closed, head tipped down. She must've felt his gaze, for a microt later her eyes snap open. She offers him a tired smile.

She doesn't smile the way she used to. The first time he'd seen her smile, as the Drak left Moya and they stood on the terrace watching the departure, he'd been all-out floored by the radiance of her smile, the way her whole face changed from a grim soldier's to a stunning goddess'. Now she smiles like a tired refugee, a homeless wanderer who's deliberately not thinking about tomorrow. She's trying to be hopeful, but the best she can muster is steely determination. These little moments of rest are all she dares to ask for.

It's all they're likely to get, either of them. He can't remember - maybe it's all they've had, little slivers of time when there was enough food, enough safety, enough humor to laugh, even at the bad things. Maybe there's nothing else to be had.

He reaches out to her. "Give me your hand," he says. "Put it on my shoulder." Oh, how things have changed - she doesn't even bother to tell him he's crazy, just rolls her eyes and plays along. "Now come here - stand on my feet." She gives him the _yep, definitely crazy_ smile, but laughs a little as she steps up. "Comfy?"

"Mmm. You?" she returns lightly.

"Yep. Hold tight." God, she doesn't weigh much - not like she used to, not like she should. The Scarrans took off every extra scrap they could; now even the muscle is thinned down to sinew and wire.

Holding her close, he starts to dance, one jilting step at a time.

She laughs after a moment. He can tell she thinks he's insane for doing this here and now - she revels in his insanity. It's just like hers.

The marriage of heaven and hell. William Blake didn't have a clue.

She lays her head on his shoulder and rests. For him, for that moment, it's enough.

The level-riser eventually crashes to a halt, and the doors slide open. "This our floor?" he asks vaguely, wanting to beg for just a few more  
minutes, a few more seconds. . .

But Aeryn's awake in a microt, and breaks away from him. "I don't know - have to get out and have a look around."

She's gone, just like that, leading the way as always, trusting him to follow, to watch her back. When did she start trusting him so?

Quickly he moves to catch up, walk beside her. They come together upon - a garden? A field of plants, here on this chunk of rock? "Never knew Scarrans were so sentimental," he comments dryly.

Aeryn's all but laughing. She throws him a smile over her shoulder, moves away from him with a lightness in her step that betrays her thoughts. He can see it in the way her hand brushes over the leaves, the way her eyes skip from one flower to another. Scarran weakness - a cave of flowers on a military base. They'll never again be real soldiers in her opinion.

"No one around," he says easily, reaching out to snap a flower from its stem.

"So - what do you want to do to get noticed?" The implication is so blatant in her voice, it's impossible to miss.

Should they - ? Why not? To find a garden in this place is so improbable that they might as well add to the improbability. Besides, he's never said no to Aeryn. . .

"I got arrested once, in college. Lemme show you."

But again the moment's gone too quickly. The Charrid guards have weapons, and he's not about to find out if they'll fire warning shots first.

"There's never enough time. . ."

Aeryn looks pretty pleased, though. She turns and laughs at the Charrids as she straightens her clothes.

*

Mom and Dad Scarran are pretty pissed that their garden's been used as a make-out spot.

"Who gave you the codes?" Staleek demands.

He and Aeryn put on a wonderful *Who Me?* show. If they ever make it back to Earth, they're definitely going into stand-up comedy.

When Ahkna leaves, it's as good a time as any to ask for Scorpy.

"Why?" Staleek questions sharply, fishing for information.

He makes up some half-brained answer, but the truth slips out on the end of the lie. "And I don't like watching people be tortured who don't know anything." He isn't thinking of Scorpius, but of D'Argo and the Blood Trackers, and Rygel with Durka, and Aeryn - most of all, Aeryn.

*

He hates Grayza. He really, really does, for a hundred different reasons, not only for what she's done, but for what she might do.

She might tell Aeryn -

But when the bitch calls, he goes. Aeryn is the best weapon he has, so she goes, too. That, and because there's no way she'd let him go alone.

Behind those grey-eyed shields, she might already know everything.

Braca leads them to the she-wolf. "Thank you for coming," Grayza says smoothly. "I'd like to make an addition to my offer." She extends a datapad.

He studies the pad, but he can't read Sebacean and she know that. Carelessly he hands it to Aeryn. "I'll have the King-Pao chicken. You want a spring roll?"

Grayza smiles tolerantly. "Actually, they're a pardon from the Supreme Council. No Peacekeepers would dare violate them."

Ding-ding-ding: we have a winner. "She for real?" he ask Aeryn, not quite daring to get excited.

Aeryn's eyes cross the datapad the way they scan shadows: hunting for dangerous threats that might attack without warning. "It would seem so," she allows. "However, it is conditional."

"Of course," Grayza says, sounding offended. "On no wormhole technology being shared with the Scarrans."

_Don't get excited, dude. Remember, if it sounds too good to be true. . ._ "What if we give these back?"

"Still valid," Aeryn answers. She slants a look at Grayza. "She wouldn't dare destroy them."

He's surprised when Braca reaches out to scoop up the pads. "I've witnessed them - so have all the principle officers."

Trouble in Paradise? Grayza's doing her best not to look pissed.

"Keep 'em," he says easily. "We'll let you know." Really he just wants to grab the pads and run - but there's nowhere to go right now.

*

On the way back to Katratzi, he suddenly remembers what he wanted to ask Aeryn. "Hey, is there any Sebacean equivalent for the phrase 'kiss my ass?'"

Aeryn ponders the question. "About as close as it gets is -" And finishes with a handful of clicks and gulps that it's going to take him a while to perfect.

"Sounds lovely. What's it mean?"

She grins. "It's an expression of defiance that means 'frell my rifle.' Literally it translates into 'shove my weapon up -'"

"I got it, I got it," he interrupts, laughing. "What's the come-back?"

She throws out a collection of sharp hisses and ticks.

"Ouch," he says. "I don't even want to know how that translates."

*

Big Daddy Scarran knows Grayza's made a good offer. He's willing to part with Scorpius to show that he's got good intentions, too.

"They're bringing him now," Aeryn says, watching the corridor with narrowed eyes.

Show time. "Guys, listen up. One riot, well done, hold the mayo. Now." Damn, now he's hungry. Does this junk yard have a Burger King? Under his breath he mumbles, "Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, special orders don't upset us. . ."

"Shut up," Aeryn hisses, and for a moment it's just like old times, Butch and Sundance bringing down shadow depositories.

Sikozu's muted whispers carry easily through the comms link. "We're very close to a conflict now."

"This ain't horseshoes or hand grenades - now means now." He's about to continue, but Staleek is coming down the corridor, and he doesn't look happy.

"A bargain is struck," the Emperor announces as two Charrids drag Scorpius into the room and fling him over the table. "However, a bargain requires trust, which thus far, has been one sided."

Aeryn's watching the half-breed very closely. He can't tell what she's thinking.

"Now you tell me what you really want," Staleek challenges.

Without thinking, his eyes slide to Aeryn. She looks back at him, shakes her head a little. What's that supposed to mean? Fine, fine - what would Rygel say in this situation?

_Make it good, John._

So he does what he can, using riddles, references and half-hidden threats to dance around the three things he wants most: Aeryn, safety, time.

The great emperor seems to believe him. That, or he just realizes that he's never going to hear John Crichton give a straight answer.

"Risky," Aeryn mutters as the emperor storms away, but there's a proud gleam in her eyes.

"My appreciation," Scorpius slurs.

"My ass," he replies.

Aeryn circles the table, takes up a position on the opposite side. For all the odd ties he and Scorpy have, Aeryn's the one who knows Scorpy better. He's had Harvey, but she's lived with the halfling, used her limited influence to protect him - he owes her a debt, though he might think exchanging places in a Scarran torture chamber equalizes things.

She watches closely as he mock-interrogates the half-breed, waiting for a tell-tale sign to give the creature's real loyalties away.

"John," she says slowly.

"You believe him?" he asks quickly.

"Yes, I do." No, no, she said it too slowly, without enough force. She's not certain.

They bicker back and forth, searching for a sign Scorpy won't give.

So he pokes a little harder, draws his weapon and finds he's actually tempted to use it. A dead Scorpius would solve several problems.

"May I speak?" Scorpius asks, and finally, there's the desperation, the sign they were waiting for.

"No," they say together, then share a brief smile. They're becoming more and more alike.

"He's telling the truth," he marvels to Aeryn. Who woulda thought? "We'll sort you out later," he adds to Scorpius, so that the half-breed won't get too confident.

And still things are quiet, far too quiet for the disruption that should be tearing the base apart. "Guys, I apologize in advance for any insensitivity on my part, but it's beer o'clock - where the hell is my riot?"

Aeryn takes a quick look down the corridor, glances back at him and shakes her head.

Rygel's evil laugh carries over the comm. "You're going to get it." Within a few microts pulse blasts sound through the open channel. "Now Crichton! And never doubt your dominar again."

"Time to boogie," he tells Scorpius. "Up you go." But the half-breed isn't terribly helpful with his own rescue. Aeryn slides one of Scorpius' arms over her shoulder while he takes the brunt of Scorpy's weight - not out of any noble gesture, only because, between the two of them, Aeryn's still the better shot.

They half drag, half carry Scorpy down the corridor. Aeryn takes out whoever crosses their path, with her fists or pulse pistol or both. He's the one who has the breath to explain things to the half-breed.

A Charrid dances into their path without warning, only to fall an instant later from a pulse blast in the back.

"Who-?" Aeryn begins, then bites off the rest.

"Braca!" Scorpius slurs, sounding delighted.

"Yeah, feel the love," he grumbles, and continues hauling Scorpy down the corridor.

They make it all the way to the docking bay where D'Argo's ship is waiting. Surprise, surprise - a host of armed Charrids have beaten them there.

"Aeryn -" he says, jerking his head towards the bay.

She nods and leaves Scorpius hanging on air, puts a warning finger to her lips when the half-breed starts to babble. Cautiously she approaches the bay, one measured step at a time, a hunter stalking her prey.

Scorpius collapses flat on the deck, gurgles, lays very still.

Dammit, can't the idiot help at all? "You better not pass out."

Apparently Aeryn's tired of playing. She drops to one knee beside the one-time mastermind, and aims her weapon at his head. "Get up, or I kill you now." And she doesn't sound like she's kidding.

Hell, if she had always planned to kill him, why now, after they've dragged him this far? Why not back when he was on the table? Would've made things easier. . .

"Choose," Aeryn demands softly, as if she doesn't really care.

Maybe she doesn't. Maybe he shouldn't care, either. "You should know when a woman's serious," he advises the downed half-breed, who he thinks might be only faking unconsciousness.

"Are you coming." She's not asking a question.

He snatches Scorpy by the front of the suit, and Scorpy responds by grabbing his arm and lurching upwards.

Aeryn's more stubborn than Scorpy. Well, he always assumed as much, but he still grins roughly to see the theory played out.

"Okay." Aeryn aims upwards, fires and sends sparks flying down into the docking bay. She scampers a few steps forward, again randomly fires, then holds her hands up high. "Don't fire or you'll detonate the bomb," she warns loudly.

Are the Charrids smart enough to know that if her claim was true, she herself wouldn't have just fired those two shots?

Apparently not. The armored soldiers stand frozen, their weapons held awkwardly in their hands.

"Well, there you go. Someone finally got smart," he says, dragging Scorpy forward. He doesn't mean the Charrids got smart; he's referring to himself and Aeryn, who have finally become a great team.

Once more Scorpy starts to sag towards the deck, and the damn bastard is so heavy he can't help but fold downwards, too. All at once the half-breed shifts his balance, swings upright, knocks Aeryn in the face with the back of his fist. The next of Scorpy's fists lands right in his gut.

He's flat on the deck in an instant, Scorpy holding his face to the floor with a hand on the back of his neck. It doesn't take a genius to figure out what's going on.

"You stupid son of a bitch -"

"I'm sorry, John," Scorpius mutters, sounding halfway sympathetic. "But you need to breathe deeply if you expect to live."

The bomb is cycling wildly, just like it had after he'd seen Scorpius' interrogation. "You're going to get us killed!" With his face pressed  
against the deck, he can't see Aeryn, can't hear her over the bomb's wailing. Aeryn? Aeryn!

He's never going to forgive Scorpius for this. Never.

"Now, if you trust me enough to live, you may well discover the truth," the half-breed snarls closer to his ear.

The bomb has begun to beep its final warning. "Trust you?" he echoes, and roars wordless rejection against the deck.

"You do not know what you're doing," Scorpius says, backing up just a little, relaxing his grip just a bit.

Crichton struggles wildly. "Yeah I do, and I'm gonna fucking nuke you and half of this damn base!"

Suddenly dear Scorpy doesn't sound quite so sure of himself. "Kill me later -"

"I should kill you now. You're still my prisoner."

Is that the hat lady? He can't see - "Technically, he's my prisoner," he contradicts. Or, better - Aeryn's prisoner. "When Aeryn wakes up, she's gonna kill him!" Which might make all this worth while, if he gets to watch.

Suddenly Daddy Scarran's red boots appear in his line of view. "I'm so pleased you're safe." Mr. Emperor doesn't sound happy. . . "Minister Ahkna's forces have done a superb job of quelling the unrest. A duty to which I'm sure she's eager to return."

After a long, strained microt, the high-heeled boots of the hat lady abruptly turn and stomp away.

"See you later, sweetheart," he mumbles as the bomb slowly returns to its normal pattern.

The red boots approach, and suddenly the weight on his back is gone. He straightens quickly, throws a jaunty "thank you" at the Emperor in Red, then crawls over to Aeryn.

She's very still, and fear momentarily clouds his vision. "Aeryn -"

But she startles at the lightest touch, jerks out of reach, her hands clutched into fists.

He quickly puts a finger to his lips.

She blinks and almost smiles. "Did we win?"

Do they ever?

"You'll be delighted to hear my guards were able to secure the rest of your crew as well," Staleek says, crouching down beside them. His voice is as gentle as a Scarran's can be, and he watches Aeryn very carefully. "Coincidentally, as they were also nearing exits. Like yourselves, I'm sure they were simply trying to avoid entanglements in violence."

Uh-oh - Daddy Scarran is starting to figure out what Johnny Radiation really cares about. He's watching Aeryn very, very closely.

"Where are they?" he demands, though not forcefully.

"There are guards placed to ensure their - well-being," the Emperor assures him. "Were you planning to leave?"

Hell yes, dumbass. "Temporarily." Probably not anymore. . . "Grayza called with a better offer." It's the best he can muster. "But you had a riot going on. We didn't want to bother you, so we decided to take our own car."

Lies, lies. Everyone here knows the truth.

"I'm glad you didn't." Staleek says, and tells him in a not-so-veiled way that if they try to leave, they'll be destroyed. "We'll transport you to the carrier."

"That's very kind." What else can he say?

"My pleasure. . .John." But Big Daddy Scarran isn't watching him; he's watching Aeryn.

Aeryn stares back at the Scarran, her eyes reflecting nothing.

*

The Charrids scrape Scorpy off the deck and drag him to a meeting chamber, dump him back on the deck and promptly leave.

He and Aeryn stand staring down at the half-breed trying to get to his feet. Scorpy looks like a bug stranded on its back, arms and legs waiving feebly in the air.

"Stupid bastard," he tells the bug.

Aeryn doesn't waste her breath. She kicks him in the gut, sends Scorpy sliding across the smooth floor.

The others show up alone or in pairs: Sikozu, Chiana and Noranti, D'Argo and Rygel.

"Crichton, that's the last of your plans we ever follow," the Hynerian announces.

Scorpy eventually gets to his feet, leans heavily on the center table for support. He stays well clear of Aeryn. "I prevented you from leaving for your own protection."

"You stuck a knife in our back," he counters.

D'Argo looks ready to return the half-breed's favor, with his fierce frown and clenched fists.

Scorpy isn't intimidated. "No. Your plan would have failed."

Pip's far from happy, too. "We could've been on Lo'La by now -"

Sikozu keeps the grey girl from advancing on her hero. "Hear him out -"

"It is quite likely the Scarrans had already disabled D'Argo's ship," Scorpius says, raising his voice to over-ride the others' protests.

"That's impossible," D'Argo denies flatly.

" -And found Moya," Scorpius adds, his voice near a growl. "Even if we managed to get off Katratzi, this place's weapons would've destroyed us."

Aeryn steps out of the shadows. "Stealth is no longer an option. Does Lo'La have enough fire power to blast us out?" She and D'Argo consult for a microt, the two warriors attempting to man-handle a rescue from scraps and smoke.

When D'Argo calls his ship, nothing happens.

And then the hat lady shows up. Things just keep getting better and better. . .

How much has she heard? He glances at Aeryn, but she's busy having a stand-off with Ahkna's body guard. He uses the only weapon he has to distract Ms. Scarran: words. They're only effective in that he's flat on his back within a few seconds, his jaw aching so badly that it might actually be fractured.

The bomb begins to cycle faster.

"Oh yes, by all means, do kill him," Noranti says, suddenly appearing at Ahkna's side. "And then we can all have a lovely dinner from his parts. I've never had human before - have you?" she asks the minister.

He watches Ahkna glance around the chamber. With one more shove at the bomb she backs away, snarling, "You're all insane." Her sharp-heeled boots stomp out an infuriated tattoo as she storms from the room.

"I could've told you that," Chiana says into the silence.

Scorpy cautiously approaches, extends a hand to help him stand. "If I could have a moment of your time, I believe I can explain things to your understanding."

*

Once upon a time a boy lived on a planet in a house with his mother and father and sisters. The boy loved stars, but him mother loved flowers. Red, blue, pink, white - while he played in the dirt, she planted in it, growing plants both common and rare. Sometimes, in the summer, he'd see his mother watering the flowers, and he'd ask her their names.

The often had funny names. "That doesn't look like a bird," he once told her. "Who'd name a plant a bird's name?"

"It has a real name, Johnny," his mother said tolerantly.

Crysterium Utilia.

A hundred heartbreaks later, it's still about flowers.

And Harvey.

"You're saying Harvey's return is my fault?" he demands.

Scorpy's many things, but stupid isn't one of them. "If the neural clone has returned. . .it is because you intended to betray me."

_Surprise, Grasshopper. I don't love you after all._

Scorpy actually does look surprised. "Would you have left me to perish with the Scarrans?"

Truth or dare, Johnny boy?

"Under the circumstances - yeah." But that really doesn't change much. "What now?"

Again the she-wolf calls, and again he goes.

Braca looks ready to have a coronary any instant now. The captain leads him and Aeryn to Grayza, and she confirms all of Braca's claims. Even the great she-wolf looks harried and concerned.

"Four hundred Scarran cannons were turned on us the microt you entered here," Braca continues, marching back and forth before them as he and Aeryn sit on the bench and watch. "Minister Ahkna informed us that, unless you return to them safely, they'd fire."

Aeryn sits back against him and watches the door. "Well, they can't do that," she says evenly. "To honor the truce, they have to let you go wherever you want." Doesn't sound worried at all.

He supposes that there's little left to frighten her anymore.

Unlike him. He's sitting right next to one of his best nightmares. If he pinches himself, maybe he'll wake up.

"They'll let us go - they just won't let you leave with us." Grayza looks greyer than before, more washed out, less all-powerful. Suddenly she stands, steps closer. "Braca, Officer Sun - could we have a moment alone, please." Not a request, but an order.

Aeryn doesn't even shift until he nudges her. "Stay on comms," he says too quickly. She gives him a long look before getting to her feet and breezing past Braca without a second thought.

He has to give the she-wolf credit - she waits until Aeryn is well out of hearing before starting in on him.

"All that astonishing wormhole knowledge, and still you will not share it with us," Grayza begins.

Wow, Mom was right - it really is all about sharing.

Grayza towers over him, willfully invades his space, and it takes all his skill just to sit still.

"You came in here big and bold, dancing on tables - and look at you now, begging for scraps - "

Poor choice of words. He's not about to let that comment slide. "I may be jammed, even dead, but I am not begging. You can get that fantasy out of your head." And he looks at her, gives her the coldest look he's ever learned from Aeryn, the solid glare that says _and don't pretend you don't know what I mean._

Grayza ignores the glare. "In my hands, you can have peace. I can have peace -"

"I've been in your hands," he interrupts swiftly, anger slowly boiling up. "There's no peace there. Just power."

"You are so self-righteous," Grayza returns.

He's laughing, somewhere inside. Or maybe that's just Harvey.

Grayza keeps going on and on. Blah blah blah.

"Welcome to the universe, Commandant," he says finally, tired of listening. She just doesn't understand how much he hates her, how much he doesn't care about her problems.

He goes looking for Aeryn, wants her like a child wants his favorite blanket. Braca's warned him not to wonder around alone. He doesn't care, but he doesn't want to run into the she-wolf again, either. At last he slumps into a seat in the Scarran shuttle, frowns darkly so that the Scarran crew will leave him alone.

Except that they don't. Jenik, of all people, is flying the ship - or, supervising the flight. He stops not two feet away and grins like a cat  
post-canary. "I take it Commandant Grayza's offer didn't please you."

"Go away, Jaws," he says, running a hand over his face.

"Peacekeepers are such an inferior species," Jenik continues, undaunted. "Limited intellect, inability to perform strenuous physical labor - odd how you selected one as a mate."

Slowly his eyes shift up to the grinning Scarran's face. This is the captain of the ship where Aeryn was held for so long. This is the creature who changed Aeryn, who drove her to hide food, stick to shadows, smile with the face of madness.

"She carries your offspring," Jenik says smugly. "I learned much about Peacekeeper physiology from her. Fragile bones, skin easily broken. . .  
females carry proto-fetuses up to seven cycles unless full gestation is triggered. Ironic, is it not, that one Peacekeeper could carry both our  
offspring?"

The implication is blindingly clear. At his hip, the bomb begins to wail.

"Crichton, what's wrong with you?" Aeryn snaps, suddenly appearing on the threshold. She takes one look at Jenik and advances with fists clenched.

Jenik himself looks concerned with the bomb's new sound effects. He says something the translator microbes miss, quickly turns and leaves.

He wants to do something but there's nothing to do. Aeryn would butcher Grayza and he'd gladly do the same to Jenik, but there's no time to tidy up personal affairs. So he only takes a deep breath, willing his heart to slow, and runs a hand down Aeryn's face.

"Nothing," he tells her. "You know Jenik."

Aeryn glares at the hatch where the Scarran disappeared. "I do," she agrees, and curses him in her own tongue.

He laughs and adds a few choice words of his own. It's all either of them can do.

"Where'd you disappear to on the command carrier?" he finally asks her when they've got a moment of privacy. Except - can they really ever be alone on this base?

"Some unfinished business," she answers, which could mean anything. Aeryn's got so much "unfinished business" that she could make a full-time career just out of tying up loose ends.

"Wanna tell me about it?" he offers.

"Later." She doesn't tell him no anymore, only promises until he forgets. Did that change happen naturally, or was it born out of the torture sessions, where everything became about stalling?

They're being watched. He's sure of it. Or is it just his paranoia?

No, he's right - there's Ahkna now, right in their path. What did she hear? Impossible to know for sure, so he just keeps talking.

Aeryn stands between him and the hat lady, does an amazing act of someone who's part soldier, part assassin, and not at all afraid. Oh wait - it's not an act.

Ahkna seems to sense Aeryn's stance, and if she doesn't exactly respect it, she at least knows her boundaries. Violence and intimidation - works the same for both Peacekeepers and Scarrans.

"Perhaps now is the time for you to hear my offer," Ahkna suggests. "You all go free. Now."

"What's the price?" Aeryn returns, because nothing's ever free.

The hat lady says some lie about Scorpy that he doesn't buy for an instant. She tries to catch his eye, but Aeryn keeps herself between them. His girl has had enough of the minister's tricks - her patience is wearing thin.

What the hell? "Well, if it 'twere done, 'tis best it were done quickly," he agrees, butchering Shakespeare like there's no tomorrow (which for him, there probably isn't.)

But Ahkna doesn't accept her dismissal so easily. She waits and waits until Aeryn gets tired of her unblinking gaze. The two females square off, and he doesn't favor Ahkna winning.

Faced against the grey shields, the minister smiles - or bares her teeth - and finally leaves the chamber.

"Thanks," he tells Aeryn. "She scares the crap out of me."

Aeryn ponders his words, staring after Ahkna. "It's the hat."

*

The bomb is heavy - physically and mentally. He sits down on the table, slips the strap over his head.

"Careful," Aeryn warns.

He throws her a quick grin, but heeds her words. Funny how small this weapon is. Sizes are never proportional. If sizes were proportionate to importance, Scorpy'd be a smurf and the bomb would be a star.

"What do you think?" Aeryn asks. She perches on the table near him, but she's still mostly turned towards the hatch. Watching, always watching.

He takes a piece of pseudo-chalk from an inner pocket and thinks about writing on the bomb's casing. What to say, what to say. . . oh, he knows. Carefully he begins to trace letters to a language the Scarrans can't read.

Aeryn's waiting for his response. He can tell by the way her eyes have narrowed that she doesn't like what he's doing.

"I think Lady Macbeth is gonna find a way to screw us - but Staleek is probably way ahead of her, which leaves us with plan -"

" -E?" she suggests, grinning despite herself.

"For elevator," he agrees, grinning back. It's also the last letter on his little bomb-note. "And I'm gonna tap-dance for the Emperor."

"Be careful," she says again. "He's not an idiot."

"No," he allows. "But he can't do jack to me as long as this bomb's ticking."

And that's when the bomb abruptly goes silent.

No more ticking.

Aeryn just shakes her head, doesn't even bother to say _I told you so._

"Oh shit," he says dully. "Um, change of plans." He slides off the table, grabs Aeryn's arm and propels her from the room.

"You can't reactivate the bomb in any way?" she asks, and there's a hint of the old Aeryn in her voice, the Aeryn who would do him serious harm if he didn't give the "right" answer.

"Not in any meaningful manner," he replies tersely. There's a hint of the old John in his voice, the John who would give her the most basic of answers while quickly thinking of another plan.

Unfortunately, the only plan he can think of isn't very good. But then, are they ever?

*

D'Argo, Chiana, Scorpy, Sputnik, him, Aeryn - they crowd into the elevator like it's some kind of Disneyland ride.

Sikozu's contact shows up just long enough to provide some kind of special something before being blasted full of holes. The red-haired woman screams when he falls outside the doors. The desire in her eyes is clear: she wants to stay, see if the Kalish is truly dead.

Aeryn can see Sikozu's intentions, too. "Get us moving," she orders, no room for argument.

Sikozu runs the elevator - but Scorpy runs Sikozu. "Take us to the bottom," the half-breed commands, and down they go.

This isn't what he planned. The surface, they need to get to the surface to even have a faint chance of Grayza picking them up.

But down they go.

Eventually they hit bottom.

Sikozu frantically works to enable the drill. Scorpy takes this opportunity to be the grim reaper of plants everywhere.

He stands next to Aeryn and watches Scorpy throw a tantrum when the shielding of the mother plant is discovered. Aeryn grins like she's never seen anything more amusing.

Chiana starts shrieking for D'Argo.

"I'll handle it," the Luxan says. He returns with the two women a handful of micrtos later. "We couldn't override their override of our override."

Suddenly Aeryn isn't grinning anymore. "That's our only way out."

"And their way in," he agrees.

Aeryn must be rubbing off on him - they're about as screwed as possible, and he can't seem to muster the will to be afraid.

*

"They're coming," D'Argo warns, taking the steps down into the field two at a time. "Hide."

Uh - where? In the plants? Oh yeah, they'll never be found there.

"Hey, did you get my bomb?" he asks casually.

Chiana gives him a concerned look. "Huh?"

"My bomb -" They forgot it. He runs a hand over his eyes. "I can't believe I left a nuclear bomb in an elevator." It sounds like a dumb joke: _Hey, did you hear the one about the terrorist who left his bomb in the elevator while  
he went to the park?_

"It's alright, you've done worse," Chiana assures him.

Like what? But there's no time to ask.

Hiding in the plants - whose stupid idea was this? Not his, hopefully. . .

"Those weapons will be useless if they're Scarrans," Aeryn says. Is that fear or anger in her voice?

"It's gonna be Scarrans," he says grimly.

"She cannot be taken alive, John," Scorpy growls.

"She", who? Aeryn, Chiana, Sikozu? What does that mean? The Scarrans never wanted Chiana. Sikozu is Kalish, a race of Scarran allies, but they might want her. Aeryn - what does Scorpy know as to why they'd want Aeryn? "Be quiet," he snaps, yanking the half-breed down beside him.

"Am I wrong, or are we frelled?" Chiana asks.

"No. There is a way," Sikozu says.

And then she does one hell of a magic trick that makes living with her for the past cycle almost worthwhile.

Back into the spiffy ride. Unfortunately, they're experiencing technical difficulties. . .

"What are you doing?" D'Argo demands with forced patience when he shoots the control panel

"Sending a message," he returns lightly, throwing a grin at Aeryn..

"What, the 'we're easy targets' message?" Chiana comments.

The elevator groans and trembles violently.

"Hey, do you know how to work this wonkavator?" he asks the Luxan.

"Do you?" comes the response.

And then everything suddenly turns into blender land. God, he's never going on the Enchanted Teacups again.

At first it's funny - Chiana's laughing, Aeryn's white teeth are bared in a fierce grin - but when his stomach starts to divorce him and move out, the fun disappears. "I never did. . .like Disneyland." At least there isn't cheerful music playing at obnoxiously loud levels.

Bump, crash, bang - it's another bad joke, but at least the spinning stopped.

"Did we hit the surface?" Aeryn demands.

Only one way to find out.

Why isn't he surprised that weapons fire nearly takes off his head when he peeks out? "Um, conference room."

Chiana looks to Aeryn. "Are we cursed? Could we be cursed?"

Aeryn considers. "Well, that depends if this will hold," she replies, glancing around at the elevator walls. She doesn't appear reassured, which isn't a good sign.

Scorpy says the rabrokator is strong, but D'Argo's doubtful. "What about the hatch?"

The recently re-awakened Sikozu shoots down that plan. "It's too far." She's got more credibility now that she's done the magic trick. She at least knows a little bit about what she's talking about.

_So what now, John Crichton?_ Harvey's silent, everyone's silent. No way to retreat, no terms of surrender, no way to survive.

A sudden cold comes to him, a peace heavy as a wool blanket, and just as stifling.

A memory: _I am out of options._ Aeryn's words, spoken as her prowler seat headed straight down to a half-frozen lake.

He understands. Suddenly he understands her - why she was the way she was, why she is the way she is. Everything becomes clear in an instant.

He's out of options, too.

He makes his final choice, sends the reactivated bomb down the open hatch.

"You reactivated it, didn't you." Aeryn's not asking a question. But he never lied to her: he said he couldn't reactivate it in any meaningful  
manner.

Is what he's done meaningless?

D'Argo and Chiana think he's made a mistake - but Aeryn doesn't. Through the dusky gloom he can see her. He can see her eyes, and past those grey shields straight into her heart. It's like looking in a mirror.

"This is your last chance!" a Charrid shouts, his voice dully carrying into the elevator.

And this is his last chance, in so many ways. Even if they somehow miraculously survive the explosion, it won't be the same. It will never be  
the same.

"Love you," he says briefly, because little moments were all they ever had.

"Love you, too," she returns quickly, because she cares too much to waste time.

When eternity reaches its zenith, he's with Aeryn Sun.

III. THEM

Moya's looking wonderful these days. Clean, bright, healthy. Alive.

They have a meal of stale grolak long hidden in an air vent.

"We'll need to replace the supplies here."

"I know where there's water, too. And weapons."

They smile.

*

They live with regret, two soldiers who ran out of options. Unwilling to do nothing, they live with the things they did. Survival is their punishment. They have only themselves to blame, and to thank.

"I'm the Osama bin Laden of the Uncharted Territories."

"I betrayed everyone and everything for nothing."

They know they are less than they were yesterday, but they hope to be more tomorrow.

They are them, but they are still each other.

Will they recover from whatever comes next?

They agree that they might.

END


End file.
